


i'll be the one to come undone

by benditlikepress



Category: NCIS
Genre: Angst, Episode Tag, Episode: s10e21 Berlin, Episode: s10e22 Revenge, F/M, Guilt, Healing, Hurt/Comfort, insomnia is a main character, kind of a rewritten storyline of berlin to ppf
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-06
Updated: 2020-02-06
Packaged: 2021-02-28 04:08:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 19,865
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22587676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/benditlikepress/pseuds/benditlikepress
Summary: ‘He checks the clock above the door and it's midnight and she's only just got here and he smiles a little because she probably abused the power of her badge to be let in. Not too good for it after all.’How 10x22-11x02 might have gone if the effects of the car crash were more harshly felt.
Relationships: Ziva David/Anthony DiNozzo
Comments: 14
Kudos: 75





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Canon divergent immediately after the car crash in 10x21 Berlin. A few bits of dialogue and story threads are taken (+ tweaked) from the following episodes. Tony also has a double bed which isn’t canon but him having a single one is just bizarre so 
> 
> I play fast and loose with the laws of the human body and medicine. Hospital procedure? I don’t know her
> 
> I started writing this in 2014 and found it on my old memory stick lmao. Chapter 1 and 3 are Ziva's perspective, chapter 2 is Tony's
> 
> Title is from On an On – Behind the Gun

They tell Ziva that she's lucky, that it "could've been a lot worse", but she doesn't see how.

A dislocated shoulder. Bruising over her chest. Nothing, really, compared to the knowledge of what her mission has done to Tony, who now lies unconscious with staff surrounding him barking instructions at each other.

They say a whole lot of words about Tony’s condition that mainly fly over her head, blocked out as noise as she tries to process everything else that’s going on. The car had hit her side, but he had thrown himself over her to protect her. Look where that had got him. Head injury. Broken ribs. Pneumothorax. The doctors carry on talking around her but she tunes them out as they continue to list his injuries. Someone comes up behind her and places a hand on her back, guiding her away and back to her own bed.

"They have his notes? He had the pneumonic plague; his lungs are weak."

"He's in good hands, ok?"

They have an arm on her back as she gets to the bed and she refuses to lie down, sitting on the edge. McGee and Gibbs soon appear, both looking over her injuries. Someone must have called them.

“You OK?”

“Fine. It was Ilan. I spoke to him. He took the diamonds.”

“You spoke to him?”

“When I woke up he was at the window. What are we doing here? We need to find him.” Ziva’s shoulder has already been reset (she hardly even felt it, adrenaline and shock pulsing through her veins) but has been placed in a bed waiting an x-ray. It seems useless now, knowing Tony is in the next room having god knows what done to him and Bodnar out there somewhere with enough diamonds to make a new life on.

“Hold fire. You can’t do anything like this. He say anything to you?”

“It must have only been a few seconds after the crash when I woke up. He said he had warned me to walk away.”

Ziva looks over Gibbs’s shoulder and sees more doctors going into Tony’s room, and after a few seconds Tony’s bed is wheeled past and down the corridor. She can’t see his face, can barely see him, surrounded as he is by doctors and nurses and medical equipment.

“What is happening?” She asks frantically, straining to get a closer look. Gibbs puts a hand to her good shoulder and gently guides her back down to the bed. He turns to McGee and nods at him, and McGee leaves the room in pursuit of Tony.

Gibbs follows Ziva’s eyeline watching McGee leave, and then turns back to her and tries to get her attention to focus back onto him.

“Is that all he said?”

“Yes.”

"What's the last thing you remember before the crash?"

She remembers Tony taking her hand, linking their fingers, how he turned to her with a smile when she said his name. Him screaming hers as he threw himself in front of her.

"I am not sure, it all happened so quick." She lies, fighting back tears of guilt and shock and a hundred other emotions she can't place. “We were just talking and we got to the intersection and the SUV came out of nowhere. I woke up and Tony was.. bleeding, unconscious. As I was looking at him I felt a presence over my shoulder; it was Ilan grabbing the diamonds from the footwell. He did not hang around, a sedan pulled up and he got inside. The car drove off at speed. I fired.. ten, eleven shots. I think a couple of them hit the back windshield.”

“Did you manage to get a plate?”

A few numbers flash in Ziva’s mind and she lists them absently, watching McGee deep in discussion with a nurse in the corridor outside.

“What’s happening with Tony? What did they say before?”

“We’ll find out. Do you remember anything else?”

“N-no. The SUV came from the right. The other car pulled up behind, I think. But we spun around a lot of times, I am not sure what direction we were facing.”

McGee re-enters the room and Ziva drops the conversation immediately.

“They’re taking him into surgery and then they’re giving him a chest drain.” McGee’s voice is soft with concern and a little panic, trying to hide it as he looks Ziva in the eye. “Does either of you have Senior’s number? I should probably call him.”

Ziva realises she has Tony’s phone in her pocket and pulls it out, unlocking it with the password Tony doesn’t realise she’s memorised.

Gibbs checks his own phone. “Vance is on his way. State troopers are waiting outside, they wanna talk to you. They’ll need your weapon.”

“I do not think that is necessary.”

“It’s been fired. They have to put a hold on it, it’s part of their investigation. Stay put.”

He raises a finger to warn her and goes back out into the corridor to talk to the state troopers. She can see the unfamiliar men stealing periodic glances at her, before they finally come in to face her.

She talks to them for a while and she's cold and not at all courteous as she repeats her story. She asks three times for her weapon back. They tell her they ‘understand it must be difficult’ but they can't - she doubts this is a universal experience.

They ask her if Tony got distracted from the road and she bites their heads clean off.

The hospital discharges her after putting her in a sling. Gibbs says she should go home and she's too tired to argue. McGee says that he'll stay, and though he's addressing Gibbs he directs the words at Ziva. She nods at him absently as Gibbs marches her out of the door.

She tells him she has to use the bathroom and barely makes it into a stall before throwing up, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand as she wills her head to stop spinning.

He keeps one eye on her the entire car ride home and escorts her to her apartment. She’s surprised he doesn’t lock her in there.

She doesn’t sleep. She spends the night wracking her brain, researching, making notes, Bodnar’s name pulsating through her mind with increasing fury as she checks the clock periodically imagining how long Tony has left in surgery. Divided loyalties doesn’t come close to covering it.

She knows that 'an eye for an eye' isn't the way these things should be dealt with; she's seen first-hand the impact it can have on a person. She'd felt it herself after Tali's death. Look at where this one had already landed Tony. But still, right now, she is unable to fight the instinct to do it. To inflict the pain that was caused to her. Time and NCIS can heal many things, but this fire inside her is something she can never shake. This is just who she is - what she is destined to fall back on, where all other instincts fail.

If she’d wanted to catch him before this happened, with Tony fighting for his life nothing could stop her.

Six hours after leaving the hospital Ziva heads out of the door again, reluctantly using a taxi.

The sun has risen by the time she gets back to the hospital and it disorientates her, everything looking too bright and fresh.

By now her painkillers are wearing off. She'd got a prescription, but she probably won't go home until tonight - she'll have to buy something on her way to the office to take the edge off.

She ends up getting lost trying to find her way to the right ward, having to stop to ask two different hospital staff for directions. She’s about to do another lap of the fifth floor when she comes across McGee sunk into a chair, head tipped forward resting on his fist and his eyes closed.

She taps him on the shoulder and he startles awake, looking up at her with sleep-deprived confusion.

"Hey. I tried calling you. He got out about an hour ago."

Ziva instinctively reaches into her pocket for her phone but it isn't there. She must have left it next to her laptop.

"Where is he?"

"He's in recovery."

"Have they let you see him?"

"Only through the window."

"Senior?"

"Booking the next flight."

"OK. Let me talk to someone and see what they say." Ziva's voice sounds robotic in her head, clinical.

“The SUV that crashed into you was registered to a soccer mom in Falls Church. She reported it missing yesterday. Waiting on an address for the sedan from the plate you got. I should probably get to the office.”

“Thank you, McGee. I will see you later.” She eventually replies when the words register.

"Ziva," he calls after her as she walks purposefully down the corridor and when she looks back he's stood up. "Probably.. looks worse than it is."

Though there's a tone of comfort in his voice it sounds more like a question than a statement. She doesn't reply.

The main hub of the ward is too busy and she can feel herself a little unsteady still on her feet as she approaches the nurses station where a doctor is stood leaning on the desk. She touches her shoulder to encourage the woman to turn around.

"Excuse me. Anthony DiNozzo? He had surgery a little while ago." Ziva flashes her badge for good measure.

"Yes, of course." The doctor grabs for a clipboard and looks at it briefly. "The surgery went well, we wanted to get him in quickly because of his medical history. Mr DiNozzo is in recovery right now. His body has been under stress so it may be a while before he wakes up."

“Can I see him?”

"You were the other person in the car with him? Are you a relative?"

"I'm his partner. Please."

She wonders if the doctor understands the double meaning of the word, and assumes she means something she doesn't. She isn't about to clarify, though, because it works and she finds herself being led towards his room.

Looking at him through the glass in the door feels like getting hit by the car all over again. It takes every ounce of courage she has to push it open, to step towards him. Knowing that bad things happen whenever she does.

He looks so dull and lifeless, surrounded by tubes and machines. It’s hard seeing Tony like this. So still, so unlike himself. Even when he’s asleep he seems to be in motion – messy hair and unruly limbs and tossing and turning. Ziva’s never been a timid person but she is now, nervous to touch him in case she hurts him any more than she already has.

“He doesn’t bite.”

The voice startles Ziva and she turns around to where the doctor is still stood in the doorway with a smile on her face. When she sees Ziva’s expression it softens, turning into a sympathetic stare.

“I’m sure he’d be glad of the company.” She says this time, smiling tightly at Ziva as she carries on down the corridor.

Ziva sits in the chair next to the bed and stares at Tony’s hand. It has a cannula in, needle poking into his hand and tape stuck over the skin. She lifts it slowly, placing his palm onto hers.

“Hey. It’s me.”

His fingers are limp and for some reason that strikes Ziva more than everything else. It can only have been hours since the last time she was holding his hand (though she has no idea how much time has passed), and now it feels like a foreign object in hers as she strokes the skin slowly as though it will get him to respond.

"McGee spoke to your father, he is on his way. And I’m here now.”

Even now, she’s taking from him – the hand in hers an attempt at comforting herself, seeking him out to calm her down like he has done without even realising so many times before.

“I’m sorry.” It doesn’t cut it, but she’s at a loss. Guilt keeps hitting her in waves and when she looks at Tony’s face now she sees a flash, hears his voice shouting over tires screeching, feels them start to spin. She blinks tightly to clear it away.

"I know you just wanted to help. I hope you can forgive me for putting you through all of this. It is not fair that this happened to you and I'm sat here perfectly fine.” She sniffs away tears. “You should not have come."

The words hurt her as she says them and she thinks about Berlin; about dancing and heart-to-hearts and falling asleep with Tony stroking her hair.

Ziva lifts his hand gently towards her face, holding his fingers to her lips for a few seconds before placing it back down on the bed.

There’s a thick tube sticking down his throat and bandages around his head but she can still make out his features, soft and expressionless. She traces her fingers along his cheek and jaw a few times.

"I know it would be for the best if I stayed away from you. Maybe it is selfish that I cannot just walk away. But, then, I do not think you would let that happen. Would you? You would come looking for me like you always do."

She isn't expecting a reply but she still waits.

She's aware of the feelings he has for her. It’s never needed words and it’s difficult not to be with the way Tony is - the way he could bound into things heart first and questions later. He'd once chased her dead body around the world. And that was before.. anything, before all of this.

She knows, too, that he must know she reciprocates, but sometimes she questions if he knows how deep it goes. That he's so much a part of her now that the thought of being without him is unfathomable, an idea so foreign she can't even begin to comprehend it.

No matter how much she wants to keep him at arms-length for now, for his own sake, the thought of getting up and leaving when he's like this would be the hardest thing she's ever had to do. That’s the thing about Tony. She breaks her rules for him; things she repeated over and over again in her head about keeping her distance from people, about not opening herself up to the chance for heartache when one or both of them inevitably comes crashing down because of the nature of what they do.

But it’s Tony. It’s always been different with him. And that’s the irony – the more she can’t stay away, the more she realises she needs to before something happens that he isn’t going to be able to recover from.

“Please wake up so I can tell you how sorry I am."

As she speaks, she senses a presence in the doorway and a nurse she thinks she recognises from yesterday enters the room with purpose. “Sorry, I was just..” Ziva is embarrassed at getting caught in the act, but the nurse dismisses her quickly with a hand as she checks the readings on the machines.

“Don’t apologise. It’s good to talk to people when they’re like this. I talk to you when I come in, don’t I, Mr DiNozzo?”

Ziva looks at the nurse more sympathetically then. She’s a middle-aged woman with round glasses and blonde hair that looks like it’s been tied and redone multiple times over the last god knows how many hours. “Is he in any pain?”

“I shouldn’t think so. How about you? You’re the one he was in the accident with?”

“I am fine.” Ziva says instinctively. “Do they know how long he’ll be like this?”

“Hopefully just a day or two. It’s the best way for his body to recover. We’ll contact his next of kin just as soon as he wakes up.”

The nurse smiles almost jovially. Ziva tries not to react.

"Sorry, I was not here when he came out of surgery. Could you explain to me what all of this is doing?"

She isn't sure why she asks - she isn't really listening as the nurse begins to talk about chest drains and tubes and monitors. She's watching Tony's face intently, wondering if she's imagining the slight twitch of his left eye.

The nurse asks her again if she's OK when she finishes her explanation and Ziva dismisses her concerns with false platitudes and a practiced smile.

When she's alone again with Tony she's at a loss now for what to say so she stays quiet, holding his hand and listening to the beeping of the machines keeping him alive.

She's so far off her game when she eventually leaves hours later that she's barely recognisable. She's almost in a daze, the heady combination of her desperation to find Bodnar and her constant thoughts of Tony leaving her unable to process anything else. Gibbs tries to insist she goes home but she refuses, and he knows by now that having her out of the building isn't going to stop her.

The noise of the bullpen becomes too much when she crosses into 36 hours without sleep and she heads to the bathroom for some peace and quiet but somehow that's worse because suddenly the air is filled by Tony - fear and crushing guilt at the fact that he's lying unconscious and she still can't bring herself to stop this mission.

She throws up again and she isn't sure if it's residual effects from the crash or everything else weighing on her. She must be in the bathroom longer than she realises because an uncomfortable McGee comes to check on her and she doesn't have the energy to threaten violence if he tells Gibbs.

She goes home. She gets 3 hours sleep spread over a 12 hour period.

* * *

Ziva isn’t there when he wakes up. She isn’t at home either, where she’s supposed to be. She’s sat at her desk avoiding McGee’s nervous glances when Gibbs’ phone starts ringing, and the two of them stare at each other before she bolts from her seat.

“Special Agent Gibbs’ desk.”

“Hello, this is Nurse Carter calling from the Walter Reed Medical Center. Is Special Agent Gibbs available to talk?”

“This is Special Agent David. Is it Tony? Is he awake?”

“Ah, Agent David. Yes, he woke up about an hour ago.”

“How is he?”

“About as you’d expect. He threw up a few times, but it’s not that unusual considering the medication and the fact he was intubated. He’s not in too much pain but he’s a little groggy.”

“Does he remember what happened?”

“He remembers there was a car accident. He was very concerned about your condition when he came around.”

“Thank you for calling.”

“If you could let Special Agent Gibbs know that would be great. Thank you very much.”

Ziva isn’t able to get away from the office until Gibbs get back another hour later. She tells him that Tony is awake and he hesitates for a moment, glancing at the lift before telling Ziva to go. She asks if he’s sure but he nods blankly in that Gibbs-way that he does, electing himself and McGee to stay in the office while Ziva gets a sit-rep and can report back to them on how he is.

The fresh air on the way to the hospital feels the best she's known it in a while. Though she's rushing she can feel one of the many clouds floating over her head lifting, and if nothing else she can tick the box that reads "Tony is going to be OK".

She, too, is feeling a little better. Physically, at least. Able to follow conversations again without feeling like she's behind a pane of glass. She's endlessly grateful to her own body that she isn't going to have to drag herself through the charade of pretending to him.

Of course, this regaining of control of her senses just opens up the next box of worms to deal with. It's all well knowing Tony's awake but it's another thing when you get to his room and he's staring at you surrounded by machines and bandages and you're reminded with a gut-punching clarity that you're the reason he's in this mess.

“Tony,” is all she can say as she looks at him, still looking small surrounded by machines but his face now clear of tubes. There’s a bandage around his head and one stuck to his nose and he turns only slightly at the sound of his name.

“Hey.” His voice is soft and it might be soreness from being intubated but it still feels kind, much kinder than Ziva deserves. “How are you?”

“How am _I_?” She walks into the room slowly. “I’m OK. I should be the one asking that.”

“You should see the other guy.” Tony tries to laugh but it aggravates something internally and he starts coughing instead, grabbing onto the bedsheets. Ziva hovers still at his bedside, watching him. “Sit down. Pull the chair.”

Ziva kicks the front-left chair leg, moving it from next to Tony’s head to further down his body where he can see her without having to turn towards her. She senses him surveying the sling her arm is in, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Bodnar?”

“He took the diamonds.”

“Damnit.”

“There was nothing I could do, he..”

“I know,” Tony’s hand reaches out for Ziva’s and she resists the urge to flinch, instead extending her good arm so he could take her fingers in his.

She wishes he would stop looking at her like that. She put him here.

He's an idiot for running after her head-first and he's an idiot for caring about her this much and he's an idiot for looking at her with such kind eyes now even as he is hooked to machines from top to bottom. She separates their hands again, placing hers encased together on her lap.

"Has anyone called Senior to tell him you are awake?"

"Coming by tonight. I told him to hold off. Still disorientated."

It’s taking him a while to get sentences out and he’s dropping words to make it easier on himself. Ziva goes to stand up.

"Sorry, I should-"

"Stay. Glad you’re here. But you should be in bed."

It doesn’t take any more than that to persuade Ziva not to leave. A machine beeps and she looks up at it, indecipherable labels and numbers telling her things she’ll never understand.

“Gibbs, McGee, and Abby will come to see you tonight, I expect.” She says politely, making conversation around the topic. “You know if not for work they would drop everything, but..” Ziva knows she’s speaking too quickly and forcefully, and Tony’s brow furrows.

“Sure you’re ok?”

Ziva smiles with closed lips. “Really. Do you remember what happened?"

Tony looks upwards to the ceiling with a furrow in his brow and Ziva wonders if it's for show. "You were about to tell me how handsome I am. Got interrupted.”

"Tony.."

"Sorry. Hey, sorry." Tony suddenly turns serious when he sees that Ziva's mood isn't one that can be helped by jokes. He’s speaking like he’s a little short of breath but trying not to make it noticeable. "I'm alright."

" _You_ have nothing to apologise for."

"Who does?"

"I should not have taken you with me."

"It wasn't your call."

"But it was _my_ quest. This is my desire to catch Bodnar, and mine alone. Involving you is just-"

"It was on the way home from the airport. I'd have gone to pick you up."

"I would not have allowed you."

"Never stopped me before."

"I do not want you putting yourself in harm's way for me." As Ziva spoke she felt echoes of a similar conversation to this, one they'd had tied to chairs in the middle of the desert. "I would never forgive myself."

"You're my partner."

“This is not about NCIS. None of this is.” Ziva can hear the incredulousness in her own voice as she speaks, as if Tony would ever dismiss this as some kind of work colleague disagreement. She knows that isn’t the case.

“I know.” Tony says quietly, which makes Ziva wonder why he would say it in the first place. She supposes it was the easiest thing to say in the circumstances – in spite of his talk of ‘post elevator us’, there were still some things they didn’t say. "Don't give a crap. I care about _you_."

"You 'don't give a crap' about NCIS? Now I know you are delirious."

"Ziva. Sorry we didn't get him."

She fights the urge to reach out for his hand again when he says that - once again his loyalty more than she deserves. Sometimes she loves that about him. Sometimes it drives her up the wall. Right now it's floating up and down the spectrum between them - so expected and yet affecting.

But Tony's so easy, and Ziva feels as though she can predict his every move. She wonders if he feels the same about her. If there's anyone on earth who could claim to understand the decisions she makes, she supposes it's him.

"What about Yaniv?"

"It is useless. He will never give up his brother. But regardless, that is not for you to be thinking about. Leave it to me."

"Need something to pass the time."

"Take up crosswords."

Maybe she isn't so predictable, because her dryness cuts through the air and the laughter that emerges from his weak throat is unexpected and loud and leaves him coughing.

"Thanks for the tip." He’s talking a little easier now. "Going to be here for a while. They're cautious because of the whole plague thing."

“I can go to your apartment to pick you up some things if you can make a list.”

“Senior can go. Your arm.”

“It’s just a little stiff, it cannot stop me carrying a bag.”

“Ziva, don’t lie to me.”

Maybe, given the circumstance, she should be finding it hard to look at him. Quite the opposite. Her eyes are continually drawn to him, seeking reassurance. Of what, she isn't sure.

"I promise. I will be back to normal soon."

It's not quite a lie. She certainly intends to be back at normal functionality soon, pain or no pain. She can't afford to wait.

Tony yawns by way of response. "You'd think I'd be wide awake."

"Your body is still recovering. Close your eyes."

He obeys without argument, sinking deeply into the pillow.

Ziva checks her phone. “McGee. They are coming by to see you after work.”

“When’s that?”

“A while. Get some sleep for now, yes?”

“Do you have to get back to the office?”

His voice still sounded so weak, and though Ziva’s mind was racing with everything she needed to do and the desire to protect him the thought of leaving right now was too much. “I will stay until you’re asleep. And please, Tony, focus on yourself. You do not need to think about me right now.”

He's peacefully oblivious to the weight of her words as he closes his eyes. Ziva leans forward and runs her hand over the front of his hair in a soothing motion. Whether it’s to distract him or herself, she isn’t sure.

He falls asleep quickly in spite of his protests, and Ziva watches his chest as his breathing slows.

He’s frowning in his sleep and it’s so unlike him, his face screwed up and his body rigid and uncomfortable. Ziva could remember the first time she’d complained about his fidgety sleeping habits when they were undercover and the way he’d reacted so theatrically about the irony of her criticising someone else’s bed manner. She smiles in spite of herself, looking down now at his frozen limbs.

She ends up sinking into the chair, lifting her knees in front of her and resting her feet on the edge of the bed. She must fall asleep herself because she suddenly becomes aware of her surroundings again, sitting up straight as she realises it's her phone ringing that startled her.

She answers the call as she exits the room quietly, watching Tony's sleeping form through the window as she closes the door.

“McGee.”

“Hey, you still at the hospital?”

“Yes.”

“The boss wants you back here. We’re heading over now.”

“OK. I will be back soon.”

“How is he?”

“Weak. Sleeping.”

“OK, well, we’re on our way so we’ll be with him.”

“Thank you. See you in a while.”

Tony’s awake when she goes back into the room, squinting.

“Boss?”

“McGee again. I have to get back.”

Tony nods but Ziva wonders if the words really register because he seems a little spaced out, his eyes already fluttering shut again.

She approaches the top of the bed and leans down, kissing the bandage on his forehead. The gesture feels practiced, and she knows what it really is: an attempt to cover up, to make Tony think everything is normal and there's nothing to worry about.

“I will be back soon.”

“I’ll be here. Be careful.”

Perhaps he's more lucid than she was giving him credit for, she thinks, as she catches his eye as she leaves the room.


	2. Chapter 2

Tony’s become a light-sleeper while in hospital. Every time someone checks his vitals, every time there’s a commotion down the hall, his brain is alert and he’s awake. When there isn’t a physical distraction to wake him up, his brain picks up the slack and he wakes up in panic. The reserves from his 24 hours unconscious ran out a long time ago, and he spends his days perpetually tired. This is the main reason why when he is woken up not long after falling asleep, his first instinct is to sigh and complain until he opens his eyes fully and sees that it’s Ziva standing in the doorway watching him.

She’s taken to visiting him at all hours of the day, so the disorientation isn’t unexpected. He checks the clock above the door and it's midnight and she's only just got here and he smiles a little because she probably abused the power of her badge to be let in. Not too good for it after all.

“Hey.”

She comes towards the bed, up near his head, and runs a hand through the tufts of hair that stick out below the bandage. He wraps his hand weakly around her side and squeezes at her hip, and he’s certain the bone is jutting out more than it usually does.

“How are you?”

She pulls the chair towards the bed and sits down, talking with a tone much too bright.

“Oh, y’know.” Tony tries to sit up a little but concedes, picking up the control for the bed and lifting the top half by several degrees so he isn’t so fully flat.

“I did not mean to wake you.”

“It’s night-time.” Tony frowns and Ziva looks guilty. “Where've you been?"

"Looking for Bodnar."

"And..?"

"Not for you to worry about." She smiles at him with the reassuring tone of a nanny trying to explain to a young boy why his dad has left again. Tony would know.

"Ziva, come on. I want to know. I almost died for this.”

It was an ill-considered joke that he regrets instantly as the words seem to slap Ziva in the face and it takes her a second to regain her composure. "I think I am close."

“You tell Gibbs when you’ve figured it out.”

She doesn’t agree because of course she doesn’t. Instead she sits on the chair next to the bed and assesses him, as though checking if he’s picked up any more injuries since they last saw each other.

When she reaches towards the blankets covering his body to remove an invisible piece of lint Tony notices her knuckles. Fighting wounds. He takes one of her hands and she doesn't immediately yank it away which is probably a sign of how feeble he looks. Some of the bruises look fresh and some a little older, a cut running along her ring finger.

“You look tired.” She says on cue, studying his face and the presumably large bags under his eyes (though it’s been a while since Tony has looked in a mirror.)

“You know what it’s like in hospital. Can’t go five minutes without someone coming in to put their hands on you.”

“Your dream, hm?” Ziva says it without thinking but Tony immediately grins.

“Oh, how wrong you are.”

"I hope you are not being too stubborn."

"I resent that. Model patient."

He's looking for a joke back, a jibe, some sense of normalcy, but his words barely seem to register.

Ziva might have told Tony he looks tired, but he has an excuse. She looks awful. Like she’s lost weight, even in the few days since the crash. It looks like she hasn’t slept a wink since then, either. The fact she’s visiting him in the middle of the night certainly lays some support to that theory.

“You still having trouble sleeping?” He asks quietly. Ziva nods.

“This is not making it any easier.”

"This whole thing isn't exactly easy for me either. Me in here, not knowing a thing about what you're doing."

“I said, you need to leave it to me.”

“I have nothing else to think about. What am I supposed to do, huh? When you’re visiting me in the middle of the night, looking like you haven’t eaten in days, refusing to tell me a damn thing about the murderer you’re chasing across the globe?”

He doesn’t mean to get heated, the frustration of the secrets and non-disclosures mixing with his over-tiredness and the sheer panic that was coursing through his body every minute he didn’t know what she was doing.

"I am sorry about that."

"Not enough to stop."

"Are you saying if you were in my position, you would not be doing the same?"

"That's different."

_"How?"_

"Because.."

Ziva ignores him as he hesitates, wondering how to end the sentence. How _was_ it different?

"Someone tried to kill you, Tony. Because of me."

"I can take care of myself."

"You cannot even stand up right now."

"This is the safest place in the world for someone to be, Ziva. Nobody is getting me in here. Think rationally."

He sounds like a rip-off psychiatrist but he’s never quite sure of the right thing to say and Ziva was somehow being open even at the same time as she was hiding things from him.

"I thought you might tell me to leave it alone. To let everyone else find him."

"Would you listen if I did?"

"I have to do this, Tony. This cannot all be for nothing."

"I wish you would stop being stubborn for once and listen to me."

"I _am_ listening."

"You can't do this by yourself. Or maybe you can, you of all people, but you're going to get hurt. You know that, right? This isn't just going to end wrapped up tight with no repercussions.” He can see she's biting her tongue and it's so unlike her. "My Hebrew must not be as good as I thought, because I could've sworn that when I dropped you off at the airport I told you you were not alone."

"Yes, you did."

"Well then. We must have different interpretations."

Maybe the words would have more effect if he wasn't trapped in a hospital bed unable to leave. Ziva certainly looks like she has no intention of walking away, her eyes flicking between him and the ground. They’re too big. She blinks a few times.

"Tony. That is not fair."

"I'm not trying to be unfair, I'm trying to be honest. I thought we were getting somewhere in Berlin."

"We were."

"So..?" Ziva doesn't say anything. Tony sighs. "This front you're putting on? You know you don't have to wear it with me. I know you. And I know what you're thinking."

"What _am_ I thinking?"

"What happened to me isn't your fault, and it isn't going to happen again if you keep on relying on me."

He's trying really hard not to regret saying all of this as he watches her visceral reaction. She always played her cards much closer to her chest than this.

"Why should I believe that? Everywhere I go, this happens to people. How am I not supposed to believe it is my fault?"

"Because it's _not_. Ziva, this isn’t you."

“This is me, Tony. This is what I made of myself.”

His throat tightens and for a second it feels like the tube is back down it, stopping him from breathing for himself.

His mouth feels dry and he turns to the jug of water on the rolling tray, pulling it towards him. He tries to lift the jug but his hand wobbles when he lifts it and Ziva grabs it from him, holding it in the air waiting for his fingers to release it.

He does, eventually, and she silently pours him a cup of water. He doesn't object still when she places the cup to his mouth and tips it slowly for him to drink, even though he is more than capable of doing it for himself.

“Look at me.” His voice is softer now and she listens, and her eyes are still too big. “I just don't understand what you think is gonna happen. Do you think I'm gonna get myself in trouble from a hospital bed?"

Maybe his frustration over all of this is heightened by that fact: the admission that he can't even get out of bed by himself. Then, he wonders how much that would be bothering him if it wasn't for the knowledge that Ziva was outside doing all of this alone.

She's avoiding his eyeline again, looking down at her lap, and she breathes in like she's preparing herself.

"I am trying, Tony. I am just trying. And I know it does not make sense to you, and I do not expect it to. I'm just trying to get through this."

"So am I."

"I'm sorry."

"Would you stop apologising? And just..." Tony exhales a little too deeply and it makes him lose his breath. "I just want you to be safe."

"I know."

“I don’t want to fight, Ziva. And I’m not gonna keep arguing my point. But.. when all this is over, we need to talk about it. About everything.”

They'd always fought, it's hardly new. But it's been a long time since they've fought about something that really matters, something where they both know the other isn't going to change their mind.

The difficulty, though, lies in the fact that it isn't really a fight. Not really. For as much as they're insisting it's different, they're both looking for the same thing.

“When all of this is over.” Ziva repeats the words and there’s almost a wistfulness in her voice, as though she isn’t quite sure if there’ll ever be such a thing.

Now there’s some sort of ceasefire in the conversation Tony signals the bag by the side of the bed and Ziva reaches it for him, holding it over his body as though she was scared he couldn't hold the weight. He fumbles clumsily in the pockets until he finds the chocolate bar Abby had brought him and offers it to Ziva.

"That is for you."

"We can go halves. I probably shouldn't be eating it anyway."

Ziva looks at him carefully, and perhaps she can see the tired concern in his eyes because she accepts the bar, pressing her hand down to break it in half. She opens the wrapper and places one half in Tony’s hand and begins to nibble at the other.

The chocolate tastes sour in his mouth after days of god knows how much medication and he must grimace because Ziva turns to look at him with concern.

He continues eating it, for her. She does the same for him, even though it looks like it's turning her stomach.

"How is your father?"

He watches her face for anything more than a poised expression. "Good, yeah. He's been asking after you."

"Is he still around?"

"Flight leaves tomorrow. Practically had to book it myself."

"Sorry to have missed him."

"Ziva. We really doing this?"

She doesn’t reply immediately. She makes the briefest of smiles, a reassuring one you might give a kid when you’re trying to keep something from them. "Just for five minutes. Please. Just five minutes where we do not have to talk about that."

There's a tired desperation in her voice as she looks into Tony's eyes pleasingly. He nods.

"Yeah, he was on his best behaviour. Didn't hit on a single nurse. Asking for updates, acting like he's Mother Theresa."

"Do you mean Florence Nightingale?"

Maybe at another time, Tony could've made more of the fact Ziva was the one to correct him. Instead they share a smile, barely there.

"Sure. It's funny, I haven't been able to shake him. Made me think about this time in boarding school when I got a chest infection and he didn't come visit."

"I am sure he just wants to help. To try and make up for the chances he has missed in the past."

"Yeah, well. I know the feeling." Ziva looks at him as he speaks almost under his breath. "Sorry, I know you said five minutes. But you understand that, right?"

"Yes, I get it. I do."

“That’s all I’m asking. So how’s work?” Tony follows her lead in talking about other things, wanting desperately to not leave it on a sour note.

“Very quiet, without you. And everyone is on eggshells around me, I have become the person everyone is whispering about.”

“Office gossips aren’t even worth thinking about.”

“I think I am just a little paranoid.”

“Probably help if you got some more sleep.”

“I can’t, Tony. I try to, trust me on that, but then I lie there and I just…” Her voice speeds up as she talks and she stops dead, looking at him as she exhales deeply.

“I know.”

“I just lie there and think about you in here.”

“I _know_.” He emphasises the word. “I can barely get a second of uninterrupted sleep but then when I do I wake up every 5 minutes. Didn’t realise it was possible to be so tired when you’re spending 24 hours a day in bed.”

It’s poetic, really: the two of them lying miles apart, struggling to stay asleep because they’re thinking about each other. It’s probably been the source of countless movie scenes that Tony is too tired and too preoccupied to think about right now.

They continue to make small-talk for a while about ludicrously banal topics and Tony finds himself increasingly fighting the fog in his brain to continue to pay attention to the conversation. It’s a losing battle, though, and as if on cue he can feel his eyes starting to flutter closed. Ziva frowns.

“You should go back to sleep.”

He’s too tired to argue even as Ziva takes the bed remote and presses the buttons so he is lying down flat again.

"Ziva, I'm serious."

"About what?"

"You tell Gibbs. I can't be there. You tell him when you're close."

He knows his tone is almost desperate and it seems to surprise Ziva, but she quickly recovers. "I do not know if I will be able to hold off long enough to."

It isn't what he wants to hear, but it's the truth. That counts for something.

She's gone again when wakes up.

* * *

He dreams about her the next time he goes to sleep, drifting in and out all night and much of the next day after her visit. It’s hardly the first time and it won’t be the last. 

He wonders if he was too harsh, finding it hard to cast the thoughts of the look on her face when he was talking out of his head. The way she’d reacted by telling him it’s all her fault. He meant it, and he knows she needed to hear it, but he hadn’t been prepared for the way she’d react.

He knows she thinks she’s doing the right thing. And he knows she believes every word she said about how she blames herself for the things that have happened to her, and the things that have happened to him too. She really believes that she needs to protect him.

While he’s angry about being left out of the loop, there’s every other emotion under the sun settled deeply in his chest now too.

He thinks about calling her to clear the air a hundred times but each time talks himself out of it, hoping for her head to pop around the door even though he knows it isn’t going to come.

He just about makes it through the day when someone does appear, but it’s McGee, and he rolls his eyes in a way that Tony takes to mean he shows visible disappointment when he realises who it is.

“Nice to see you too.”

“Those for me?”

“From Jimmy.” He places the small stack of DVDs on the table next to Tony’s bed, next to the portable DVD player Senior had brought him from home. He hasn’t touched it yet. “I thought you’d be 12 Bond movies deep by now.”

“Yeah, well. Had things on my mind. Can’t stay awake for more than an hour.”

McGee sits down and they make small-talk for a while, avoiding talking about Ziva and Bodnar and NCIS in general. He can see there’s things weighing on McGee’s mind that he’s debating saying – a line fixed between his eyebrows. A nurse comes in to check Tony’s vitals and he’s fidgety, trying not to physically squirm out of her grasp as she takes his blood pressure.

"When can I go home?"

"It's going to be a little while, Mr DiNozzo, I'm sorry. With-"

"If you mention the plague again I'm just gonna walk out of here."

The nurse smiles. "It really is the best place for you. I’ll leave you to it."

McGee watches the nurse leave the room with passing interest. “You giving them a hard time?”

“Getting a little sick of this room. How's Ziva?" McGee hesitates, floodgates finally opening, and Tony isn't prepared to wait. "You two still doing your little side action?"

"No. She's cut me off. All of us, actually. We're doing our part but.."

"She's on her own thing."

"I'm sorry, Tony. I've been doing what I can."

"Yeah well try harder." His voice is sterner than he means it, but McGee doesn't react much. He bites down frustration and worry and lingering resentment and refocuses on the conversation. "What've you got?"

“Did Ziva tell you she got another call from Bodnar a couple of days ago?” Tony must visibly show some surprise. “She didn’t?”

“She was here yesterday but she’s not telling me anything. Did you trace it?”

“I’m really sorry. I screwed up. I knew something was wrong, and I was right. I don’t know how I could be so stupid.”

“Just tell me.”

 **“** We were played by Bodnar. He set up a trap, and I fell right into it.”

“What exactly did you do?”

“He knew that we'd try and analyse the call to Ziva and determine where he was, so I did exactly what he wanted me to do. I analysed the background. Let me show you something.” McGee pulls his phone out of his pocket and opens it, and Tony can see his hands are shaking minutely from pent-up anxiety. “Look at this. I created an algorithm comparing the background behind Bodnar to recently posted videos on CyberVid. Found this video. It's gotten over 10,000 hits in the last few days.”

“It's the same background.”

“Yup, and watch what happens when I run them simultaneously. Bodnar wanted to make it look like he was in New York. He matted himself into the video. Now I have no idea where he is.”

"It's not your fault." Tony eventually concedes - and it isn't, not really. "You'll get him. He'll slip up."

"I hope so."

"Keep me updated."

"She's really not telling you what's happening?"

"Not a thing. Before Berlin she kept me out of the loop, but it's different now. It's like a brick wall when I ask her about this stuff. I don't know what she thinks I'm capable of from a hospital bed, but.."

“Y’think she’s trying to protect you?”

“Driving me crazy.”

“Cut her some slack. She just lost her dad. Imagine how it must’ve felt, seeing you like that in the car.”

“That doesn’t mean she can..”

“Just think about it. OK? You're probably the closest thing to family she has left."

"That's.." he trails off, not sure where he's going with this. “I think I upset her, some of the things I said to her yesterday.”

“What, Ziva? I’m sure it’s fine. She’d rather you were honest.”

“Yeah, I guess.” Tony can hear the scepticism in his own voice. “Just watch out for her, please, Tim.”

McGee watches him for a second before nodding and starting a new conversation. He can see Tony’s mind is elsewhere, though, and he doesn’t stay long.

* * *

He isn’t sure whether it’s sheer exhaustion or the effect of his racing mind, but Tony seems to sleep better that night. In fact when he wakes up there’s a nurse in his room who he didn’t hear enter, tapping him on the shoulder.

“I’m sorry, Mr DiNozzo. Time for obs.” The nurse apologises as she sees Tony open his eyes and shuffle straight. He raises his arm for her to place the blood pressure cuff onto his bicep. “You slept through a few checks during the night, I hear.”

“I did?”

“Uh-huh.” She begins to look at the machines surrounding him. “The other agent came to visit again, too.”

“Which one?”

“Sorry, I don’t remember her name. The one who was in the accident.”

“Ziva?”

“Yes, that’s it. It was just when I started my shift so a little before 6am but she stayed for about an hour, you must have been exhausted to not notice. She said she didn’t want to wake you.”

“How did she seem?”

“She looked worried about you. I explained you’re responding well but it didn’t reassure her. She left this for you.”

The nurse bends down and stands back up holding a blue neck pillow, the donut kind that wraps around your shoulders. There’s a post-it note stuck to the front and Tony reaches for it. It says nothing more than “hope this helps. be back soon x”, written in a rushed version of Ziva’s handwriting. He places the note down on the table next to the bed and takes the pillow from the nurse. When he’s unsuccessful at getting it around his neck, she sighs and takes it back off him, helping him lift the top half of his body forwards and placing it behind him.

“It must be nice in your line of work – to work with someone who cares about you that much.”

“Yeah. It is.”

The thought spins in Tony’s head when the nurse leaves and eventually he plucks up the courage to reach for his phone. He types a message quickly before he changes his mind.

**_You should’ve woken me up_ **

Unexpectedly, he gets a reply almost immediately.

**You said you have been having trouble sleeping.**

**_I wouldn’t have minded_ **

**I would. I was not sure I would make such a happy awakening after the other day**

**_How’s it going? McGee said something about call tracing. You didn’t tell me he called you._ **

**You know why. This is not your fight. I am not risking it happening again.**

**_You already know what I'm gonna say._ **

**Still looking**

**_Will you just please be careful? Take care of yourself._ **

**That is my place to say. You do not need to worry about me, Tony. Focus on getting better. And I’m sorry for everything. Truly. x**

He puts away his phone rather than replying, feeling the frustration building up.

He's certain she's avoiding having to talk face-to-face after their conversation the other day, fearful he'll react similarly if she continues to withhold from him. Protecting herself from something that deep down it's clear she doesn't have a way to justify.

She's wrong, though. He just wants to talk to her – to see her, get some kind of reassurance that she’s actually OK and isn’t planning something that’s going to get herself killed. No such reassurance comes.

Tony marks the days by the non-Ziva visits he gets. Someone stops by after work every evening without fail, usually bearing some kind of gift that gets piled next to the bed and left for the next visitor to stare at and not comment on.

The next night is Gibbs’ shift; the first time he’s come on his own. He’s always a man of few words but even for him he’s quiet when he sits down, looking around the room appraisingly and waiting for Tony to take the lead.

“Y’know, my lung capacity isn’t so hot right now. You might have to pick up some slack, boss.”

"How are you feeling?"

"Like I got hit by a car, mainly. Also a little like I’ve got a week-long hungover. While we’re on the subject of cars.." Gibbs’ blank expression says it all. “That bad, huh?”

“You really wanna talk about your car?”

“No. I’m trying to find a way into conversation.”

“After all these years, you need an excuse?”

"I'm worried about Ziva.” Gibbs doesn’t react much, other than to blink. “After Eli's death I noticed it. She became secretive. More focused. Now she keeps disappearing, visiting me at all hours of the night. I don't think she's sleeping or eating. She wants-"

"Revenge? Yeah, I know that."

"She's not gonna let it go, Boss."

"It's out of your hands now. Out of hers too."

"Like that'll stop her. Hey, speaking of hands, did you see hers..?"

"You leave it with me. I don’t want you trying to do anything stupid.” Gibbs pauses. "How was she in Berlin?" Tony takes his turn to pause. That was not an easy question to answer. Gibbs turns to look at him more carefully. "Anything you didn't tell me, about Berlin?"

“Nothing relevant.” He dares to say and Gibbs is staring his down now, challenging. It’s the truth.

“We’re keeping an eye on it.”

“No offence, boss, but I can’t just take your word on that.”

“Is that so?” His voice is challenging but quiet, and Tony can’t hear malice.

“I think she’s planning something drastic. Please – just.. I’m not saying don’t let her out of your sight. But you have to stay on top of this. Because as much as you think you’re looking, this is all she’s thinking about every second. She’ll get him first.”

The expression on Gibbs’ face when Tony stops talking is one he can rarely remember seeing. The tone in his voice as he says “OK” is almost subordinate, clearly having found in Tony’s face the confirmation he was looking for that Tony is right.

Gibbs leaves after a period of silence in which neither of them is sure of what to talk about. They separate to the stark contrast in their current lives: Gibbs to continue their frantic hunt for a killer, and Tony to lie here and stare at the ceiling.

* * *

Another fitful night’s sleep follows, machines beeping and air-con chill in the air and dreams that teeter on the edge of becoming nightmares.

His phone rings and he actually ignores it, not prepared to answer. When it rings again, almost immediately, he springs to attention. It’s McGee.

“Tony. Is Ziva there?”

“Not seen her in a couple of days. Why? What’s going on?”

“We think we know where Bodnar is. Heading there now.”

“And Ziva’s missing?”

“I don’t know. Look, I’ll call you back.” McGee hangs up abruptly and Tony starts dialling Ziva’s number before he’s had time to catch his breath. It rings out. He tries again. It rings out. He calls Gibbs, and McGee answers, repeating that he will call back soon and hanging up again.

Tony knows that if this was a film, he would be ripping lines and needles out of his arms and jumping from the bed. In reality it took all of his willpower to reach his phone on the table, so he sits still and turns his phone up and down repeatedly in his hand, willing it to ring. 

Blessing or curse, the current state of his central nervous system isn’t enough to withstand even the anxiety and adrenaline pumping through his veins.

He falls asleep with his phone in his hand and his heart racing.

An hour and seven minutes later, he’s awoken by a persistent ringing. It takes him a second to realise what the noise is before he’s fumbling to get his phone to his ear. He doesn’t look who it is before answering.

"Bodnar's dead."

"Ziva?"

"She's safe. Gibbs will call you later, we're just heading back to the office."

"Thanks Tim."

Tony exhales, feeling the weight that has been sat alongside the physical trauma on his chest for the last few days dissipate.

A nurse soon comes in with his meds and he drifts in and out of sleep for a while after that, waking himself up and checking his phone as best he can.

The third such time (or was it the fourth?), he wakes to a lingering presence in the doorway. He knows who it is before he opens his eyes.

"I've been looking for you."

Her lip is split open, one side of her face is covered in cuts, and her hair has been haphazardly re-tied.

"Vance sent me home." She says as she stands in the doorway, hands rubbing the front of her trousers. "Bodnar is dead." Tony nods imperceptibly, not sure how to react. "He fell." Ziva adds to answer a question he didn't have the courage to ask.

Tony has no idea what to say. Really there was no way to know how to proceed in a situation like this. Cop platitudes can't cut it.

"Are you hurt?"

Ziva shakes her head a little but she seems in a daze still, as though Tony's words aren't actually reaching her.

"You didn't tell Gibbs."

"No." Ziva's voice is quiet and there's maybe a hint of apology mixed in with the absent steadfastness. "I did not think through what was happening."

"I guess it's over now." Tony offers, knowing any frustration he feels is misplaced right now. "What can I do?"

"Don’t make me talk about it. I will tell you everything. Not now."

"OK." Tony replies easily though cautious, and though he's been worried about her for hours now that hasn't dissipated upon seeing the look on her face. He knew when to push and when not to by now. “Come here.”

She comes further into the room but doesn’t sit down and doesn’t get too close to the bed, leaving an arms-length of space between them. Her hands are shaking and Tony can see that the numbness is battling against the adrenaline coursing through her. He'd probably be jumping off the walls.

"Do you need to get checked out?"

She shakes her head slowly. "Nothing is broken."

"Not what I asked."

"It is nothing a night's sleep will not fix."

"Are you planning on getting that any time soon?"

Tony knows she hasn't wanted to hear this lately, that she's frustrated by his insistence in worrying over her, but he can't help himself when she looks like this.

"I do not need protecting."

"I know. I want to." Tony adds, and it might be the most sincere thing he's ever said to her. "You haven't been yourself."

“Given the circumstances, that is hardly..” Ziva’s voice starts at its normal tempo and then fades as she speaks. “I am not sure what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything right now. Let’s just get a nurse in here so she can take a look at you.”

Tony presses the buzzer by his bed for assistance without waiting for a chance for her to object.

The quiet they fall into is almost absurd. Tony is just about able to register the sound of her breathing, the controlled way she is trying to regain control of it. As though she’s just ran a 5k.

“Is everything OK, Mr DiNozzo? You rang?”

The nurse takes a second to capture his attention away from the woman stood next to him who is avoiding eye contact and standing too rigidly.

"I don't suppose you have a free couple of minutes?"

"What's up?"

"Would you mind taking a quick look at her?"

The nurse looks at Ziva properly for the first time, and rather than being combative Ziva seems to shrink away from her sympathetic gaze.

"Perils of the job, huh?"

She doesn't answer or argue, just gives the nurse a smile that you might believe is sincere if you don't know her as well as Tony does, but he can see right through it and the absence of anything but vacancy in her eyes.

"I'm afraid I’ll only be able to give you a quick once-over, you will have to go to the emergency department for something more thorough. Are you happy to be examined in front of Mr DiNozzo?"

Ziva nods. She doesn't object as the nurse encourages her to sit on the edge of Tony's bed, though she gives him a glance which makes her tired frustration clear.

"Did you hit your head at any point?"

"No." The nurse casts an eye around her temple, looking at the cuts on her face before moving down her arms. The touches are clinical against Ziva’s frozen form in a way that turns Tony’s stomach.

"Would you mind lifting your shirt so I can take a look at your chest and abdomen?"

Ziva goes one further, removing her shirt completely. The stiffness of her bad shoulder doesn't go unnoticed.

"That's from the accident? It's been seen to?"

"Yes. It was reset, it is just weak still."

The nurse presses fingers and looks carefully at the bruises on Ziva's chest and the side of her ribcage, and Tony is caught between not looking and stealing glances at the purple skin, fear and worry his ever-present friends.

“OK, you can put your shirt back on.”

She struggles resolutely to raise her arms to get the shirt over her shoulders, shrinking her head and neck down as far as she can to aid the process.

"Well you're right, I don't think anything is broken. Let me get some wipes for the cut on your eye, just to make sure there's nothing in it."

"There is really no need, I know you must be busy."

"You can clean it yourself." The nurse answers in a compromising but firm way, not unlike Tony he thinks to himself. "But I would really ask you to come in tomorrow and get checked out properly."

Neither of them say anything while the nurse is gone and Tony can almost physically feel Ziva's thoughts, the way her body stiffens a little suddenly and she avoids his eyeline even as he painfully cranes his neck to get a better view of her.

The nurse returns and presses a few antiseptic wipes into Ziva's hand, which she soon discards into her pocket.

They're alone again and neither of them is sure what to say. Or, more likely, where to start.

Tony's staring at her and it's clear she's aware of this because her every movement looks self-conscious, like she's being watched. She notices a scrape on her trousers where the material has ripped a little and she picks at it with her fingers.

“I’m sorry. About the other day.”

It isn't what needs to be said, but it's a start.

“You have nothing to apologise for.”

“I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“I know. It was.. everything else. Not you. Everything you said was right.”

She’s still sitting on the bed, back against his thighs, twisted towards him so he can only see half of her face.

He is careful not to be the one to reach out, the fragility she tries so hard to mask threatening to burst. He waits to see if she'll seek out his touch and she does, barely, a single finger placed on his closed fist. The lights are too bright and her finger is too cold.

“How are you?”

“I’m fine, Ziva. I’m getting better.”

She nods and hooks her finger around his bent thumb. She’s watching the movement intently, her head bowed.

He thinks, again, about how much she's gone through alone. Pushed everyone away, even before Berlin when she was keeping secrets from him. He'd thought they'd made progress in the past year but she'd tried to become a mystery again, not realising the ships were too far gone to be called back. She'd picked McGee because she knew he wouldn't probe her the way Tony would, but he'd still figured out what was going on. For as much as she tries to hide, he can see through it.

"I wish I could've helped."

Her face changes like the wind. The practiced Mona Lisa smile and the vacancy are gone, and her eyebrows are furrowed and for a split second she bites her bottom lip. "How can you say that? How can you be sat like this and say that?"

"You don't have to go through everything alone."

She's just staring at him now and he wonders what he's said wrong.

"Look. Look at what this has done to you. What I have done to you."

"Ziva, none of this is your fault."

"Maybe not, but it did not stop me. You nearly died and I still did not stop. What does that say about me?"

Tony isn’t sure he’s ever in his life been searching so desperately for words and finding them so hard to come by. “Seems like this is something you had to do.”

Ziva is quiet for a moment, and he can see tears threatening to spill. "Then why doesn't it feel better?"

Suddenly she’s really crying and before too long sobs are wracking her body in a way Tony has only ever seen when she sat with her father’s body. She leans forward and lowers her head to his bed, breathing into the sheets and grabbing them in her fists. It’s too close for comfort, the material against his chest, and he’s powerless to do anything but run a hand through her hair, making reassuring noises that go unnoticed.

It's like a switch has been flipped from the stoic figure she was a minute ago and he's breathless just listening to her. He hears the word “sorry” and there's a thick lump in his own throat now, not sure who she’s apologising to.

She goes quiet after a few minutes and Tony can feel her breathing slowly going back to normal, though she makes no efforts to move her face from the blanket that’s covering the top of his body just below his neck. He understands that this is probably a release – everything hitting her at once, but he’s starting to get a little concerned now.

Tony's phone starts ringing and Ziva finally stirs, sitting upright with a red face and worried expression.

"It's Gibbs."

She nods, and Tony answers after a beat.

"Hey, Boss."

"You spoken to Ziva?"

"Yeah, she stopped by. She's probably home by now." Tony shares a look with Ziva who looks grateful, wiping her eyes and composing herself. She gets up from where she’d been sat and places herself down on the chair next to the bed.

"Good. That's good. She’d already dealt with him by the time we got there. Says he fell."

"So I gather."

"There'll be paperwork, but still. One less thing to worry about."

"Uh-huh."

Gibbs pauses. "Everything alright, DiNozzo?"

"Yeah, yeah, fine. Sorry, it's just late. New painkillers. Speak tomorrow?"

"OK. Get some sleep." Gibbs, never one to hold a long conversation where a few words would do, hung up with a slight bemusement in his tone that his most chatty agent isn't in the mood.

“Thank you.” Ziva says quietly when Tony put his phone down on the bed. “I’m sorry, I do not know what is wrong with me.” She’s looking down at the bedsheets, still holding them in her hands.

“It’s ok. Ziva," Tony calls for her to look at him and she does though her eyes must be stinging. "I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.” The hospital bed probably gives it away without the words being needed, but it seems like it's what Ziva needs to know.

Ziva nods, fiercer now. As though she's coming back into herself like a small child after they've been upset.

He wonders for a second if he should mention her father and the fact he'd think she did good, but conversations about Eli were a minefield at the best of times. It was difficult to gauge how Ziva views him - the complexities of the emotions she evidently feels towards the man who both raised her and betrayed her.

“This is all such a mess.”

“Yeah. That’s one word for it.”

Ziva smirks wetly and wipes the back of her sleeve over her face. Tony notices that she’s up on her toes, legs tensed.

"Hey, come back up here."

He pats the thin strip of bed at his side. Ziva scoffs a little incredulously.

"I will crush you."

"I'm already in the hospital."

"Really, Tony."

He hadn't been expecting her to say yes but he is a little surprised when she moves her chair closer still to the bed. Her arms now resting on the blankets around where the top of his chest is.

When he raises his hand he can just about reach her face and he wipes at her cheeks, blotting tears with his fingers. She uses her own to wipe them stubbornly, as though she's only just registered the wetness, and he moves to stroke her hair.

“This is the wrong way around.” Even as she speaks she can't help but lean forward and rest her cheek on his chest, almost where it was when she cried, expression now comfort-seeking as she looks up at him as he continues to stroke her hair slowly. His body is stiff beneath her and it's as if she doesn't dare press her head down properly, only lightly making contact with the fabric of the bedsheets.

"Hey," Tony says again, and this time Ziva lifts her head towards him so she's looking him in the eye, anchoring her arms either side of his body. "It's gonna be OK."

There's such sincerity in his voice that it surprises even him and she looks at him with wide eyes as he implores her to believe it.

“I wish I knew what else to say.”

"It does not matter what you say.”

"How about this? Can I do it?" He signals her eye now he can get a proper look at it, seeing the dirt encasing the cuts. She looks at him for a long moment before diverting her gaze with a small nod, hands in her pocket retrieving the wipes she had discarded.

Tony's own hands are still weak and it takes effort for him to fiddle the packet open, raising his hand gently to her face.

She flinches a little and he pulls back, fighting against every judgement and desire to keep her here and not let her out of his sight. She doesn't apologise, though she looks like she might, but she moves her face back towards him as an invitation to continue.

He wipes at her eye at a glacial pace, half out of consideration for the stinging and half because he feels as though he doesn't have proper control of his limbs yet. There was dirt embedded deep in the cuts, bits of dust and whatever else had been on the ground wherever it was she'd ended up fighting.

She doesn't move immediately when he discards the wipe on the table next to him. He runs his finger along her chin and presses it lightly with his thumb.

“Good as new.”

She doesn't reply, instead lowering her head back down onto his chest, stroking the material of the bedsheets between her hands and burying her mouth in them as he looks down at her.

He can't remember the last time she looked so young. Even when they first met and she was barely 23 she didn't look like this.

Tony can't admit the pressure is starting to cause his chest to ache, so he tries to subtly readjust himself but Ziva notices and lifts her head, sitting up properly in her chair.

They sit in silence for a while. Tony watches her as she stares into various spaces around the room, and her eyelids flutter and blink on occasion as though she's thinking deeply about something.

He wishes he had any idea what he could do to help. A blueprint of words to say or some magic code that will stop her feeling like this. She looks like she's in shock and the look on her face hurts, _physically_ hurts him.

He'd intended to have a proper discussion about what happened the other day the next time he saw Ziva but every thought of that had dissipated as soon as he'd laid eyes on her. How could he care about that now?

This - whatever it is between them is bigger than him and it's bigger than Ilan Bodnar and it's survived a hell of a lot worse than a minor missing episode.

He continues to watch her and now she’s studying something on her wrist, poking it, and Tony takes it in his hands and pulls it up to his face. It isn't a new wound: it's a healing dent, a couple of days old he would guess. He lifts her wrist to his mouth and kisses the spot and she watches him with expectant eyes.

He doesn't do anything else, letting her arm fall down on the bed. She ends up stroking his hip through the layers of material as they both sit there in silence, minds racing.

Tony loses track of the slight semblance of time he had, though he can feel his head clouding over yet again with tiredness when a member of staff Tony doesn't recognise enters the room.

"I'm sorry, Special Agent David." The nurse's tone is stern but sympathetic and Tony is grateful of that. He knows the nurses probably have opinions about her visiting at all hours, using her badge to get in (after all, they've been in similar situations themselves at NCIS) but they've never let it show.

"Of course." She responds dutifully with a professional smile in spite of the cuts and tear stains on her face. “I should go.”

“You’re sure?”

“They will start charging me rent.”

It falls a little flat as she tries to direct a smile at him to accompany the words when they’re alone, her heart not in pretending.

"How did you get here?"

It seems to take her a moment to remember. "I got the bus."

He's a little surprised nobody called the cops; a young woman, dazed, covered in bruises. "Get a cab. You heading home?"

"Yes. I have to complete my paperwork and then I have a meeting with Vance in the morning."

"Sleep first. Take a shower."

“I will see if I have time.”

"Ziva," Tony reaches for her hand and she clutches his fingers tightly. "call me when you're done with Vance, OK? Please."

He tells himself he won’t be the first to say goodbye, but as Ziva continues to hesitate by the bed without moving it becomes clear neither of them are going to.

Ziva nods and separates their hands. She begins relaying the blankets that have been disturbed by her presence and Tony feels like a sick old man, wishing he wasn't so frail or that he was capable of the kind of processing his brain needed to try to be able to help in this situation.

"We’ll be OK." Ziva is still looking down at the blankets but she smiles and it's almost surreal. "Get some sleep."

"You too." She grabs for his hand again now and uses her other to tap his. "I need to go." She suddenly states as though she's just remembered, and she doesn't let go of his hand until she's out of reach. Tony watches through the glass in the door as she disappears down the corridor.


	3. Chapter 3

The first days after Bodnar’s death passed in a blur of paperwork and formalities. Some time off had been gently suggested to Ziva, and when she’d objected it had been more forceful.

She is enjoying the time off, which surprises her. She had booked a spontaneous one-way flight to Israel and had been travelling, visiting distant relatives and Schmiel and other old friends who had probably thought her dead by now. She’s never thought of herself as a person who does things on a whim but she is enjoying the freedom – the first time in a long time she didn’t have something foreboding hanging over her head. Early morning walks and late-night dinners and swimming and reflections and writing. She spoke to people who regaled her with stories of her father, and others who wouldn't dare speak his name.

But as her mind got clearer she found herself thinking more and more of Tony, ringing the hospital to check on him, debating when to get back so she can see him for herself. The guilt she had felt over his condition is still there, but slowly that was being replaced too.

It's nearly 3 weeks since she'd seen him. The guilt she feels about that is, if nothing else, distracting her from the guilt she feels over him being in hospital in the first place. She'd called him as promised after her meeting with Vance saying she was going away for a while and he had been supportive, making a joke about harnessing the powers of hospital machines into some kind of superhero ability while she was gone. It hadn’t quite made her smile but the effort was still appreciated, as it always is with Tony.

She rings him now from the back of a bus as she makes her way towards Tel Aviv, another whim in the end. She’s impatient as it rings out, imagining him fumbling at his bedside for his phone. She isn’t overly surprised that he doesn’t pick up.

She opens an instant messaging service.

**Sorry I missed you**

**_Where are you?_ **

**On a bus to Tel Aviv**

**_Tel Aviv? Exploring your roots?_ **

**Something like that. Reconnecting. Thinking.**

**_Thinking about…?_ **

**At the moment, you.** Tony opens the message immediately but doesn’t start typing, and in the pause Ziva writes again. **You and a million other things. Are you home yet?**

**_Not getting my hopes up but the doc says the next couple of days_ **

**Want some company?**

Ziva’s heart is quickening as she watches the ‘typing..’ in the top corner of the screen. **_Yes :-)_**

 **Be back soon. x** Ziva types her reply quickly and pockets her phone, looking out of the window at the cars rushing past.

* * *

She calls the hospital in the cab from the airport. Tony got released a few hours ago, and so she heads home first to shower and get changed.

She stops at the coffee shop by Tony’s apartment, and she knows she’s dawdling a little because she isn’t sure what to expect. She hums before picking him up a fruit tea and knowing he won’t be pleased about it.

She is crossing the street when she sees Gibbs and McGee exiting Tony’s building, and she turns around and starts walking in the opposite direction in the hopes they won’t see her. Even as she ducks her head she is confused as to why – why she’s hiding from them, why she doesn’t want to see them right now.

She doesn’t look back over her shoulder until she gets to the end of the block, at which point she sees them both in the distance getting into Gibbs’ car. She slowly starts meandering back towards Tony’s building, keeping her head towards the buildings rather than the road. She could be a coward sometimes.

Inexplicably she feels tears welling in her eyes as she approaches Tony’s door and she swallows them down as she knocks, feeling guilty for him having to get up to let her in. Expectedly it takes him a while to get to the door, but as the seconds pass she feels more and more like she should’ve waited a few days for him to settle back in before visiting.

When he opens the door she isn’t expecting the rush of relief she feels. She knew he was ok but it’s different seeing him now, seeing him actually stood in front of her with a wide smile on his face. It’s strange - she hadn't realised how much she'd been struggling to breathe until she saw him, and now it’s like she could exhale for the first time since the car crash.

“Ziva. Hey.” He takes in her face and then the drinks in her hand.

“I am sorry, the door was locked.”

“No, it’s ok. I wasn’t sure you were still coming.”

“I said I was going to.” Ziva shrugs even though she understands why Tony would be hesitant, given her recent behaviour. He moves to let her into the apartment and she sees the bags of groceries and flowers on the coffee table. “Visitors?”

“Boss and McGee dropped me off. That’s from Senior.” He says with a confused expression about a gift-packaged potted plant. “He’s in Tuscany, coming back again next week. I told him not to bother, but..” His voice trails off and though he might sound confused Ziva knows that he will pleased to see him when he arrives.

“I will put these away for you. You sit down.” Ziva puts down the drinks and picks up the grocery bags, pointing Tony to the sofa. Predictably he ignores her, picking up his cup and following her into the kitchen. He leans heavily against the counter.

“So, Israel?”

“I am on leave.”

“Voluntary, or..?”

She smiles, a little bitter. “Not as much as they would like me to believe. But it has not been such a bad thing.”

“No?”

“I think I need some time. It was good for me to get away.”

“To be honest, I was starting to wonder if you were avoiding me after that day in the hospital.”

She could understand why he would think that. “Not at all. It was just something that I needed to do.”

“A lot’s happened recently.”

“Not just to me.” Ziva opens the fridge and grimaces as she begins to clear it of out-of-date food. “How are you doing?” She looks back at Tony with a practiced smile, and the space between his eyebrows crinkles ever so slightly.

“Good, yeah. Given the circumstances. I won’t be back at work for a little while, but I’m glad to be out of the hospital. When are you back?”

“Vance said to call when I got back to DC so we could arrange a meeting. I think I will contact him tomorrow.”

Ziva continues to put the groceries away in Tony’s fridge as they move in companionable silence, broken only by Tony groaning when he takes a gulp of his drink.

“What is this?”

“It is good for you.”

“I don’t need health supplements, I’m fine.”

“It is tea, Tony. But you are looking better."

He really does. The colour was back in his cheeks, his eyes seemed brighter. Plus he was standing up and not in a hospital bed, which was a marked improvement.

"I feel better. Amazing what a few weeks unable to move can do for the mind."

"Sarcasm?"

"A little. It's kinda true, though, in a way. I guess I'd had a lot weighing on my mind before and it seems to slowly be working itself out."

She knows what he's referring to but dodges the trail of thought for now. She was worried it would be awkward, but it isn't. She's incapable of feeling anything other than relief that he's really stood there in front of her, tap dancing around the issue.

"Sit down. I will be through in a moment." Her smile is polite and careful and he obeys after registering a look in her eyes, leaving her alone in the kitchen to finish putting everything away and taking a few seconds with her hands grasping at the worktop, composing herself for when she re-enters the room to join him.

Tony is sitting in the corner of the couch, back straight against the extra cushions that have been placed against the back of it. She takes the empty space on the other side.

Ziva feels too formal now, sat on the couch with a distance between them. She shuffles a little closer, the gap between them closing, and Tony seems surprised but not unreceptive. She keeps her hands on her lap but turns slightly towards him, eyes on her fingers.

“I am not really sure where to start.” She concedes with a wry smile.

“Yeah. Yeah, neither am I.”

Tony doesn’t go to say anything else and Ziva can feel him watching her out of the corner of his eye.

"I know when you were in hospital I told you I was going to tell you everything one day. And I am - I want to. I made a promise to myself that I would be entirely honest with you. But.. it may take me a while. You know it is difficult for me to talk about."

"OK." The word is inviting and small and Ziva can see he's waiting for a question of some kind.

"I am not sure I have a right to, but I am asking if you can be patient with me."

"There's no rush. I'll be here."

"OK." Ziva exhales easier now. She looks down at her hands but stops herself, forces herself to meet his eyes. “I'm sorry I have not been around."

“Why did you go?”

“I did not really put much thought into it. I needed some space to think, and especially with everything that has been happening in the last few months I thought Israel seemed like the place I needed to be.”

She didn't realise how hard it would be to look him in the eye while saying all of this. She can see the expressions filter through them as he follows her sentences quietly.

"The nurses would tell me, y'know. When you rang. They're great, but they aren't the best secret keepers."

"It was not a secret."

"So you just..?" Tony prompts.

"I just wanted to know that you were OK."

"You could've called me."

"I am a coward." She says succinctly. He stops looking her in the eye for a moment and his hand lands on her thigh. Ziva stops talking as he stretches his fingers out slowly, the tips stroking her skin. It seems to be an absent touch, the energy strangely loaded, and he removes his hand again as if realising it would make her continue. "I thought you would tell me to come back.. thought if I heard your voice it would make it difficult for me."

"I wouldn't have done. Not if you needed to be away for a while."

"I did."

"You could've called."

Ziva thinks back to when she'd been the one saying those words; spending a summer waiting for him to reach out to her instead of suffering in silence. "I am sorry I didn't. After everything that has happened, I needed some time to breathe."

"What was it - you thought you'd run away while I was too incapacitated to chase after you? Get a head-start?" There's a joke in his voice but she can see he means it.

"It was not like that."

" _Did_ you run away?" Tony's voice is quiet and maybe there's a little fear mixed in even through the kind probing.

"Maybe. Not.. from you. Or NCIS, not exactly. I think I just wanted to be somewhere else for a little while. I needed perspective. I cannot sit here and tell you I am back to normal now, because I'm not. It may take a while. But.. I missed my home, and I missed you, and I wanted to see how you were."

It's all coming out now. Things she'd barely been able to admit to herself. She'd made a promise on the plane ride home that she'd do this - tell him everything she could, give him some kind of insight into what's been going on inside her head. It isn't just for his benefit but for hers too: once she says it out loud, there's no excuse to avoid the issue anymore. Once it's out there, she has to confront it.

"Can't really blame you for needing a break after how it went down with Bodnar."

“This is not just about Ilan Bodnar, Tony. It is about my father, and.. Ari, and everything else that has happened. Things that have weighed on me that I refused to acknowledge. I do not want to live my life burdened by the past. Not if I can help it. I want to believe that I am entitled to the same happiness as everyone else, though a lot of the time I do not feel that way. It is a process."

"This is something you've been thinking about for a long time?"

"Yes, since before I went to Israel. I let things get on top of me in a way that is not like me. I always knew I would need for the dollar to drop one day.”

Tony smiles at her then and it makes her chest tighten. "Penny.”

“The past couple of months, everything I pushed down just came to the surface. My father dying means I have no family left. And I know he and I have not always had the easiest of relationships but it hit me harder than I would've imagined. I understand you have experienced loss too, so you might be able to sympathise, but to lose everyone in the circumstances I have, and then for you to get badly hurt.." Ziva exhales, "I suppose it got in my head. It was like I weighted everything I was feeling against Bodnar and convinced myself that with his death I would feel better. But I did not, and I still do not."

“I've been worried about you for a while. I’ve never seen you like that before."

"I know you have. And believe me when I say your words have not been in vain. I think even after everything that has happened, I can count myself lucky to have someone like you. I do not always deserve it, but..."

Ziva can see Tony go to argue and then stop himself, content to let her keep talking. It’s true – a lot of the time she doesn’t think she deserves happiness, and especially doesn’t deserve the things people like Tony offer her. She is self-aware enough to realise that she has experienced more than her fair share of death and tragedy, seeing the people that she cares about get hurt time after time. Perhaps it is only human for the brain to start making connections between it after so long.

"I spent so much of my life having the people I cared about taken away or being betrayed. Having to rely on people who I would work with for a mission and never see again. My job at Mossad did not involve a long-term team. The relationships I have with people at NCIS, that is not normal for me in the way it is for you. You had sports teams, and college, and Baltimore. It is still new for me, even after 8 years."

"Is that why you pushed me away? Kept me out of the loop?" Tony says it quietly but it still seems brave of him, asking questions where something needed digging.

"Yes. I cannot fully explain it, but yes. I wanted to protect myself from you trying to stop me, but I also just wanted to protect you.” The clarity she says it with is not missed on Tony and he watches her carefully. "I know I did not handle it in an ideal way, but it was the only way I could think of to process all of this.. this pain, of which I am the common denominator. And then you, you wanted to help me, and whether it was my fault or not you ended up in a coma, Tony. But still you did not let up. In all of this yes, there is a part of me that believes one day you will realise I am not worth everything you do for me. It would be wrong to lie about that, because I am sure you already know it. Everything you have done for me since my father died... I do not think it is normal. Even for you, dutiful as you may be."

"No. It isn't."

"I think that is why I struggled with it. I distanced myself when it was the last thing I wanted to do. It is hard for me to accept that someone could do it without motive. That I do not have to fight everything alone. Other people come and go but I have only ever had myself.”

Tony averts his eyes and Ziva wonders if he’s thinking about their conversation in the bathroom when they got back from Somalia. She told him this much back then, and though she had been less blunt about it she had known he understood why she had struggled to trust him even though she had no real reason not to.

“I knew you were right.” She continues talking as Tony stays quiet, emphasising the word. “What happened to you.. I could not risk it happening again. The thought of you not being here was not something I could allow to be a possibility. And I knew I would not survive with that on my conscience. So I pushed myself away to protect you but I also did it to hide myself from your gaze because I knew you would see right through me. Perhaps there are still parts of me I am scared for you to know."

"You don't have to face things alone if you don't want to."

"I feel guilty." Ziva feels tears threatening again and she smiles with her top lip covering her bottom as she places fingers on the place on Tony's chest where she knows the surgical scar is. "Guilty that someone could be so selfless. Could put themselves in harm's way for me - not as a job. It was really hard to see you in hospital. I realise that is.. selfish, when you were lying there unconscious."

“You can’t blame yourself for everything that happens. In our line of work, it’s..”

“I know. That is why I went away. What I am trying to work on now.”

“Well, I’m glad you’re back. I’ve missed you too.”

Ziva knows he isn’t saying it to upset her but it does so anyway, and the tears that have been welling spill almost instantly. She doesn’t think she’s cried as much in her lifetime as she has in the last couple of weeks – it’s as though years of pushing it down has left it all erupting now.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you in all of this. It was never intended. I care to much about our.." the words die on her tongue as she hesitates over how to end the sentence. "I care too much about you to put you through all of that. I really am sorry. For everything."

"Sign of weakness."

"I think it is OK to be weak sometimes. It is a difficult lesson to learn, but I think I need to."

"There's nothing to apologise for."

"There is, Tony. And I need for you to hear it."

"I forgive you." Tony says quickly and Ziva's laughing now in spite of herself, the sound wet with tears as she hits his arm lightly with the back of her hand.

* * *

They talk for a while about Israel, Ziva telling stories of the people she visited and the sights she saw. Tony doesn't make any smart remarks and then Ziva wonders if it was cruel of her to think so, because he doesn’t really do that anymore. Not about things that matter. It's been a while since she's heard a movie reference from him but she'd rather do pretty much anything else in the world than admit she's missing them.

He's just listening. Really listening - in a way that has her keeping looking up at his expression to see if she's missing something. There's a look in his eyes she can't place and a smile tickling the edges of his lips that makes her feel guilty for how worried she was about this conversation.

With every word it’s as though weight is lifting off her shoulders. She finds herself smiling, and meaning it, as though she is coming back up from the depths she has been in. Getting it off her chest is more cathartic than she'd ever envisaged - she had never much been one for talking it out.

And there's the fact it's Tony, too. She's never had to try to censor herself to feel understood with him, and that's probably what she's missed most about not open with him in the ways that matter the last couple of months. She knows she only has herself to blame, but the way they were at the end of last year was special. Both of them trusting each other implicitly, sharing things they'd never told anyone else, the knowledge that there was something between them nobody else had the full picture of. She's missed that feeling, and the fact that she can feel it creeping back now when she'd thought it had been left for dead is an unexpected but welcome surprise.

Maybe that's why in spite of all of this talk, there's still some ambiguity about the way they over-corrected after what happened in Berlin. For as much as she's glad to see him, and they'd talked loosely around their motivations for acting the way they do towards each other, she isn't quite sure where they stand.

He looks like he wants to kiss her. That only confuses her more.

"And now you're back." He finishes when she goes quiet, having reached the point in the story where she tried to call him from the middle seat at the back of the bus.

"And now I'm back."

"And what? What's next?"

"I think I just have to carry on working through it. How, I am not sure. But each day it is getting easier to understand. I am getting easier to understand."

"Work?"

"I am not sure I am ready to go back yet."

"You shouldn't rush it. Talk to them."

"I will. I am not sure what Vance will say with you already off work."

"It's not your responsibility to cover for me. They'll find someone."

"Do you know how long you will be off?"

"Two weeks maybe. Depends how long I last before refusing to stay at home any longer."

"If I am not allowed to rush it, neither are you."

"OK, deal. We'll have free time to hang out like normal people do."

He holds out a hand for her to shake and she takes it with a smile, tiny flickers of electricity flitting through her. There's a real ice broken between them now, a thawing of things Ziva didn't realise had needed it.

His touch is always gentler than she expects.

"So come on, I have told you everything about what I was doing. What did you get up to while I was away?"

"Oh, you know. Lying in bed. Sometimes I switched sides."

"You must have done something, I cannot imagine you of all people surviving that. Did you watch any good movies?"

"Some. I tried, but they kept getting interrupted by nurses updating me on calls from 'the other agent, the beautiful one, wanting to know how I was doing'."

"They did not say that."

"I don't know, they were pretty taken with you."

She knows it's a lie - she doesn't think she's ever been more dishevelled and more erratic than she'd been in the presence of those nurses, but it's the kind of lie Tony tells to see if it'll make her smile, even in a derisory way.

“Too early for food? I’m not exactly in a fit state to cook but between the two of us I think we have enough working body parts to order takeout.”

It’s early evening now but she isn’t really in the mood to eat. “My treat.”

“What kind of painkillers do they have you on?” Tony asks with a cheeky smile that makes Ziva instinctively roll her eyes. “You pick what we have.”

“Really?”

“I trust you and your judgement.”

“I know I have not always given you reason to.”

“Ziva. It’s just food.” His voice is quiet and while it’s sincere it’s almost playful. Stopping her internal monologue from finding another excuse to segue into something else.

He’s right. It’s just food.

They end up lounging on the couch with the pizza and it’s comfortable and easy, so unlike everything between them in the last couple of months. They're watching The Talented Mr Ripley and Tony is fairly quiet by his standards. Ziva is barely picking at it but she's enjoying the movie.

"Hey, Matt Damon or Jude Law?"

"Then or now?"

"Both."

"Jude then, Matt now."

"Huh, interesting. For me it's Gwyneth Paltrow then, Cate Blanchett now."

"Cate, both times. No competition." Ziva assesses easily, throwing a smile Tony's way which he returns.

"You're wrong but you're being nice, so you can be forgiven."

"My opinions cannot be wrong, that is why it is called an opinion. Cate Blanchett is a truly beautiful woman."

"I'm not disagreeing."

The easy air between them is accentuated with light chuckles and they settle back into the film.

They had always been fairly tactile with each other and that usually didn't limit itself when they were alone, though tonight it's a little stilted as Tony's range of movement is limited and Ziva is cautious about hurting him. She has her legs folded up underneath her, knees pointed towards Tony, and at some point after the first half hour of the film they end up resting on Tony's thigh. A little while longer and his arm rests on top of her legs, hanging over the side of them. He occasionally strokes her leg lightly, but it's clear it's not a conscious movement. The mark of being comfortable around somebody.

On screen, Matt Damon is talking about how nobody ever sees themselves as a bad person. His companion disagrees, asserting that some people are tormented by their past actions and Tony stiffens slightly at Ziva's side – she thinks he's about to make comment, but instead he smiles.

"Y'know, you never did teach me."

It takes her a second to realise she's talking about the piano, which Matt is continuing to play as he talks.

"I am surprised you remember that conversation. You were pretending to be asleep to avoid talking to me."

"I wasn't _avoiding_ you."

"No?"

"I was.. meditating."

"Ah, you're right. I remember. You were thinking about how I told you I was a screamer. Stunned to silence by your intrigue."

"Well, you were very intriguing."

"Even when we had not long spent a weekend in a hotel bed together, and then followed that up with an entire day in a storage container?"

Hard to believe they've known each other for nearly a decade.

"Especially then."

On screen, the other man leans over Matt Damon, resting his head on his shoulder and playing the piano over the top of his arms.

"I could still teach you one day, if you wanted."

"Really?"

"Sure. When you are feeling better. It is a shame for a piano to sit there unplayed." Ziva casts a performative glance at the pristine instrument across from where they're sat.

She realises that maybe she's taking the niceties too far - trying too hard to make up for things, too quick to get back to normal. But even if that's the case for herself, it seemed to be making Tony happy. And he could be unbearable when he was injured.

Neither of them move for a while after the film ends, and Ziva tracks Tony’s eyeline down to her arm on her leg and the hand that is now stroking lightly. She can tell he’s thinking about something, but she isn’t quite sure what.

“It is getting late. I should probably get home.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Tony, I-”

“Stay.” His voice is quiet and it comes across as more of a suggestion than a request, though Ziva’s not sure if he’s asking for him or for her. “I want you to stay.”

“OK.”

She thinks about going through the charade of saying she’ll sleep on the couch, but she figures they’re probably past that point by now. Even if she says it, she knows where she’ll end up falling asleep.

This line between them is tangible and ever-present and she relies on it almost as much as she relies on Tony, but somewhere between the opera and Schmeil and a Berlin dancefloor she’s lost her footing and suddenly that line doesn't look as reassuring as it once did. She sought comfort from knowing there was boundaries in a place she no longer wants them.

What Ziva is wearing isn't appropriate sleepwear but she figures if she removes her trousers and bra then her long-ish t-shirt and underwear will make do. The shirt is short enough that you can just about make out the tattoo at the top of the inside of her thigh, but then Tony's seen it all before. Tony himself is already dressed in the casual clothes he was wearing in the hospital and so takes himself to bed while Ziva goes to the bathroom to get ‘changed’.

Ziva's always had the belief that there is no room for prudishness between partners in a field like theirs, since long before she joined NCIS. Though, of course, their hand had been forced by them spending several days naked in bed together not long after first meeting. It's funny thinking about it now, even more so after Berlin where it had somehow been at the forefront of their minds in spite of everything else going on.

She watches from the bedroom doorway as Tony takes his medication with a grimace, feeling a little as though she’s intruding on something private. The vulnerability he would usually try to hide (though not so much anymore). As he turns to put his container back on the bedside table he notices her standing in the doorway.

"What are you thinking about?"

"Jean-Paul Ranier." Definitely not the answer he's expecting. "Are you comfortable?" Ziva asks breezily as she enters the room, looking at where Tony is lying flat on his back with just the one pillow elevating his head.

"Uh, no. Never."

"Can I do something to fix it?"

"Sponge bath?" Tony responds far too quickly, and Ziva takes a pillow from her own side of the bed and hits his face with it.

"I will not hesitate to leave."

"You wouldn't." Tony turns his head to look at Ziva as she climbs into bed, and she concedes with a roll of her eyes and a smile that he's right.

"Brave of you take the risk." She settles down on her side facing him. There's a lamp turned on by his side of the bed and he's glowing from it.

"Sorry I'll have to wake up in 4 hours to take my next dose."

"That's OK."

She smooths the covers over her body tightly and Tony is watching her out of the corner of his eye. She looks up at him self-consciously.

"What?"

"Do me a favour. Don't lie there like that all night."

"Like what?"

"Like if you move an inch you're going to smother me. Please, feel free to snore and throw yourself around the bed as you always do."

Ziva scoffs. "The concept of irony is lost on you."

"Believe me, it isn't. If you shared a bed with yourself you'd understand."

"Just go to sleep, Tony."

"I can never sleep after taking my meds."

"You have been yawning for hours, I'm sure you can."

"Sure that isn't just the impact you have on me?"

"I am fairly certain, yes."

Tony's phone starts ringing on the table alongside him and Ziva is about to lean over him to reach it for him but he grabs it for himself, limbs still stiff but seemingly less painful than his attempts to do the same action in hospital.

"Hey Probie. No, I'm good. Why? Who says I've been alone? That would be telling." McGee must say Ziva's name because Tony's eyes instinctively flick to her. "That would be telling." He repeats. "Ask her yourself. Yeah, I said I'm fine. 'Kay. Talk tomorrow."

“Secrets?”

"McGee figured out you’d been here in 2 seconds flat. Wanted to know when you're going back to work."

"I will call Gibbs after I speak to Vance."

"Before." Tony corrects her. "Call him first."

"I am not sure what to say."

"You know how he is on the phone. Functional mute. You'll hardly know he's there." Ziva chuckles and she can see a smile playing on Tony's lips. "He's a good listener."

"You are right. I think I am just.. a little scared."

The words makes Tony turn to look at her, unexpected as it likely is coming from her.

"I bet you were scared to talk to me too. And look how that went."

"I was. But it is different with you."

That makes him smile, and he turns his head back to look at the ceiling.

“I meant what I said earlier. I did miss you while I was away. I missed you before that, too.”

He's silent for a few seconds and they cut deeply. She can't see his facial expression from this angle.

"Thanks for coming."

The words run through her, emitting guilt that he would think to thank her for something she should've done in the first place.

"Thank you for being so understanding. Through everything."

“I’ve got your back, you know that by now. But if you wanna repay me..?”

"What?"

"I left my neck pillow in that bag down there. Could you grab it?"

Ziva follows Tony's pointed finger to an overnight bag by the bedroom door.

"Has it been helpful?"

"For sure. Thanks."

She hops back out of bed and bends down, tipping out the tightly packed items before she finds the pillow she purchased at the bottom surrounded by underwear.

"Please tell me this is clean."

"Without seeing what specifics you're talking about, I couldn't tell you." Ziva makes a noise of objection. "Just get back over here, would you?"

Ziva looks at him then, the smile that's both warm and a little knowing. It's there again - that unknown secret between them.

She gets back into bed and they lie in a silence that remains content even if it's clear they've both got things they're waiting to say.

"Y'know before the crash, when we were in the car. You were going to say something."

The question is a little out of the blue from the possibilities in Ziva's head, though maybe she should've seen it coming.

"Yes, I was."

"What was it?"

"Well.." She buys herself time by stretching out the word a little and pausing on its end. "Obviously you know that trip had been.. charged.. for me. Everything surrounding it: my father, Bodnar, Yaniv, Orli Elbaz. In the end it had been a little anti-climactic, and on the flight on the way home you and Yaniv both fell asleep and I had some time to think about things. About my father, in particular, and the fact I had even flown there in the first place. The things people do for love. Not just me - but Orli too." The 'and you' isn't said out loud but hangs in the air between them, mutually acknowledged. "That was why I told you a little about it on the way home, it had been weighing on my mind. What you said to me about Orli. Do you remember?"

"Yeah, I remember." His expression is pensive and she can’t quite tell if it’s for show.

"Nobody has ever made me feel that before. Perhaps a few people have said similar sentiments, but I have never believed it. You are the only person I believe."

Tony seems to think about saying something and then stops himself. Usually she’d stop talking herself at this point and she wonders if that’s what he’s thinking, but it’s late and it’s dark and she can see him gazing at her now. His eyes are wide and inviting and it’s all she can do to not reach out and touch him but she needs to get this out first.

"I hope I have not ruined this by everything I have done in the past month, but I really care about you, Tony. I should not have let all of this happen without letting you know how much you mean to me. And I think I just wanted to tell you that. And to say.. thank you. For all the times you have said those things just in case I believe you."

“You know I’d say that stuff a hundred times over if I thought you needed to help it.”

“I should tell you more the weight it carries when you do.”

There isn’t a smile on his face but there’s one in his eyes as the words hang between them.

“You were gonna say a lot then, huh?”

The smile is there now and she returns it with a shake of her head. It was a skill, the way he could strike the balance between sincere and joking so well these days. Always knowing which button to press to ease through the situation.

“Go to sleep, Tony.”

“Can’t.”

“Close your eyes.”

“Thanks. I’ll try that.”

Ziva rolls her eyes and it’s so easy, it’s always so easy with him. Even after everything that’s happened.

Head resting on her hand with her elbow holding her up, she turns slightly so she is hovering above him. She lifts her other hand to his forehead and brushes his hair back. She looks at his eyes from this angle above him as they track the movement of her hand and then return her gaze, crinkled and glinting in the close light.

She’s in love with him. But then she’s known that for a long time.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"You protecting me?" Tony asks, referencing the other times Ziva had been in this position over him.

"I am just relieved." She says eventually.

"I'm fine."

"You are."

She's close enough that she finds herself looking at each of his eyes individually, gaze flicking between them. The smile on Tony's face deflates slightly, replaced by a more sincere and nervy version.

"Take a picture, it'll last longer."

"I'm sorry?"

Tony's face softens. "It's an expression."

“You and your expressions.”

It would be so easy to lean down and kiss him now – she thinks he might even be expecting it, the way he’s looking at her a little wide-eyed.

"Do not do that to me again." Her voice is quiet and it isn't really what she wants to say.

"You've gone soft on me."

"Nobody will ever believe you."

"Believe what?"

The playful smile is enough and she kisses him then, lowering her lips down to his while cautiously keeping a gap between their bodies.

She smiles against his lips and his hand is in her hair now and she can feel the guilt clawing back into her brain at how rigid the rest of his body is.

His lips, though, are surprisingly gentle. They’ve kissed before, of course, but it’s never quite been like this. Never loaded with messages, a statement of things they wanted to prove. Tony’s tongue is slow and purposeful as it makes its way inside her mouth and their lips separate for a split second as Ziva wonders what would’ve happened if she’d done this in Berlin like she’d wanted to.

The kiss deepens and Tony’s hand in her hair is pulling her down tighter to him now as it gets more intense but Ziva can feel his breath turning more ragged and knows it isn’t just because of her. She pulls back slightly and Tony opens his eyes, confused.

“What?”

“I do not have an oxygen mask for you here.”

"You aren't going to break me."

“Maybe not, but I still think you should sleep.”

Ziva kisses him again lightly, twice, three times.

“No fun.”

Tony's grip on her loosens a little and he runs fingers affectionately over the side of her face. The feeling is so light and the look in his eyes so intimate that Ziva feels a couple of goosebumps on her arms as she moves herself back down onto the bed, this time pressed up against him.

He doesn't react facially as he turns his stiff neck to the side and down to look at her head positioned a little below his. They aren't quite cuddling but she has her hands wrapped around his forearm tightly.

He kisses her temple and Ziva thinks it's wrong, he's the sick one, and so she kisses his cheek and Tony laughs at how it somehow feels competitive.

Tony leans with the arm Ziva isn't holding hostage onto the table to reach for the neck pillow and stuffs it unconvincingly behind his head. He looks at her with an apologetic smile and she sighs without malice as she leans up to tuck it properly behind him.

They end up holding hands and it's both domestic and tentative, natural but nerve-wracking and when Ziva catches Tony's eye he smiles.

She still can't sleep, and that's OK. She's cutting herself some slack.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think Ziva is dorky enough to say "count to a million, on my way" and believe me it took all of my willpower to not include it


End file.
